Billionaire Elon Musk on Sunday, credited his father for teaching him the fundamentals of "physics, engineering and construction".
The world’s second richest man said that the teaching of his father Errol Musk, a South African retired electromechanical engineer, “is more valuable than money”.
Musk, who owns several companies like Twitter, Tesla and SpaceX said that he has not “inherited anything ever from anyone”, quashing the long-running rumour which claims his father owns an emerald mine in South Africa and that he had given him financial assistance.
Errol Musk had claimed in an interview that he used emeralds from an “under the table” mine in Zambia to finance his son’s escape from South Africa to the US.
Musk said nobody has provided him with "a large financial gift" and that his father did not support him "financially after high school in any meaningful way".
Instead, Musk and his brother had to financially support their father after his small electrical/mechanical engineering company “fell on hard times”, making him “essentially bankrupt for about 25 years”.
“Our condition of providing him financial support was that he not engage in bad behaviour.
“Unfortunately, he nonetheless did. There are young children involved, so we continued to provide financial support for their well-being,” Musk said.
He again denied the existence of the emerald mine. Earlier this month, he also tweeted: “I will pay a million Dogecoin for proof of this mine’s existence!”
He noted Errol Musk told him that he owned a share in a mine in Zambia, which he believed “but nobody has ever seen the mine, nor are there any records of its existence”.
“If this mine was real, he would not require financial support from my brother and me.”